Cox Cemetery
Sidney vicinity, Comanche County, Texas
Marker Inscription
William Driscol Cox (1839-97) and his wife Amanda (Shugart) moved with their family from Tennessee to Texas in 1872. Cox taught in Robertson County, then (1876) bought and moved to a 300-acre ranch at this site. He taught the first school in Sidney and served 1882-84 as Sheriff of Comanche County. This cemetery was opened at the death of infant Mary Jane Cox (1875-76), sixth child of the family. Amanda (Mrs. W. D.) Cox was buried here in 1882. In 1886, Cox donated the 1-acre family burial ground to the Methodist Mission in nearby Bibb, as a public cemetery. In 1895 he sold most of his land to a nephew, James Sampson Cox (1866-1941), who later was one of the area's largest landowners. Although Bibb Mission closed in 1908, this facility continued in public use. In 1934, J. S. Cox bought and added three-fourths of an acre to the original ground. Under leadership of O. S. Cox (1895-1966), a grand-nephew of W. D. Cox, the fence and arched gate were installed in 1959. Reunion associations of the Hurt and Steele Families, connected by marriages to the Coxes, have helped maintain the cemetery. The Cox Cemetery Association was organized in 1968 with L. D. Cox, grandson of J. S. Cox, as the first president. (1977)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
William Driscol Cox brought his family from Tennessee to Texas in 1872 and settled a 300-acre ranch here, teaching the first school in nearby Sidney and serving as Comanche County sheriff. The cemetery began with the 1876 burial of his infant daughter Mary Jane, and in 1886 Cox donated the ground to a Methodist mission as a public burial place. Generations of the Cox family and their kin have tended it ever since.
Why it matters
Family burial grounds like this trace the deep roots a single pioneering household could put down, shaping a rural community across generations.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
In the 1870s, Texas was filling up fast. Families from the older Southern states, Tennessee among them, moved west looking for cheap land and a new start after the upheaval of the Civil War. Central and west-central Texas, including Comanche County, drew many of these newcomers.
Comanche County, in the hilly cross-timbers country southwest of Fort Worth, was then on the edge of the settled frontier. Ranching was the main way of life, and communities were small and scattered. Schools, churches, and local government were still taking shape, often thanks to a few determined individuals.
Rural cemeteries of this era often began in a heartbreakingly ordinary way: a family lost someone and buried them on their own land. Many of those family plots later became community cemeteries, especially when churches or neighbors took them over. The Cox Cemetery followed exactly that path.
People & events
William Driscol Cox and his wife Amanda, born Shugart, brought their family from Tennessee to Texas in 1872. Cox first taught school in Robertson County. In 1876 he bought a 300-acre ranch at this site and moved his family here. He went on to teach the first school in nearby Sidney and served as sheriff of Comanche County from 1882 to 1884. Being both a schoolteacher and a sheriff tells you how much a capable man could be asked to do in a young frontier county.
The cemetery began with a loss. Mary Jane Cox, the couple's sixth child, born in 1875, died as an infant and was buried here. Amanda Cox followed in 1882. In 1886, William gave the one-acre family burial ground to the Methodist mission at nearby Bibb as a public cemetery. With that gift, a private grief became a place the whole community could share.
In 1895 Cox sold most of his land to his nephew, James Sampson Cox, who later became one of the area's largest landowners. The Bibb mission closed in 1908, but the cemetery stayed in use. In 1934 J. S. Cox bought and added three-quarters of an acre. In 1959 O. S. Cox, a grand-nephew of William, led the work to put up the fence and arched gate. The Hurt and Steele families, connected to the Coxes by marriage, helped care for the grounds. In 1968 the Cox Cemetery Association formed, with L. D. Cox, grandson of J. S. Cox, as its first president.
Its place in the American story
The Cox Cemetery is a small example of a very large American migration. After the Civil War, many thousands of families left the Upper South for Texas, and their arrival reshaped the state's population, culture, and economy. The Coxes' path from Tennessee to Robertson County to a ranch in Comanche County was a common one.
The cemetery also shows how rural communities built their institutions from the ground up. A family plot became a church-sponsored public cemetery, then outlived the church that sponsored it, and was finally cared for by a community association. Across rural America, those voluntary efforts did work that no government did.
Above all, this place shows how much family ties mattered in holding rural communities together. More than a century of care, passed from a pioneer to his nephew, grand-nephew, and their descendants and in-laws, is the kind of quiet continuity that has kept countless small American cemeteries from vanishing.
If you visit
The Cox Cemetery is in the countryside near Sidney, in rural Comanche County. Look for the fence and the arched gate put up in 1959, which mark the entrance to this long-cared-for burial ground. It is still a working community cemetery, so visit quietly and respectfully.
Inside, you can trace the story the marker tells through the stones. Look for the Cox name across several generations, and for the Hurt and Steele families who joined the story by marriage. The oldest graves, including the infant whose death started the cemetery, are a moving reminder of how hard frontier life could be.
This stop suits travelers interested in family history and the rural roots of Texas. Pair it with a drive through the ranch country of Comanche County and visits to nearby small towns. You'll see how communities like Sidney grew from a handful of families, a schoolhouse, and a shared place to bury their dead.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · William Driscol Cox
- · James Sampson Cox
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Pendergrass Cemetery
Sidney vicinity, TX
William and Emaline Pendergrass left Tennessee for Texas in 1849 and put down permanent roots in frontier Comanche County by 1873. A community builder, William helped found churches and a school, and in 1883 gave a plot of his land to bury a stranger found nearby—the first grave in what became the family cemetery. He deeded the acre to the community in 1888, and generations of descendants now rest among its more than five hundred graves.
Community of Sidney
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Sidney took shape around 1870 when early settlers located along Jimmie's Creek, building a log schoolhouse by a spring in 1877 that also hosted the town's Methodist, Baptist, and Church of Christ congregations in turn. A store, post office (named for a storekeeper's son), and Holstein dairy herds followed, and by the early 1900s the town had doctors, drug stores, and a telephone exchange. It also basked in the fame of nearby Round Mountain, the first field laboratory of world-renowned geologist Dr. Robert T. Hill.
Bibb Community
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Bibb sprang up when Anglo cotton farmers settled western Comanche County in the 1870s, and by 1891 seven men platted a proper town of 44 lots. At its height in the 1890s it bustled with cotton gins, general stores, a school, four churches, a broom factory, and Masonic and Odd Fellows lodges. As roads improved and rail bypassed it, the population drained away; today no trace of Bibb remains on the ground.
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